Phil Mitchell
Phil Mitchell was a co-creator and supervising animator of ReBoot. Phil Mitchell is a member of 'The Hub', the team responsible for the creation an development of ReBoot, the first computer generated animation series. Phil was born in 1962 and raised in Warwickshire in the heart of the English Midlands, a region steeped in history, ancient architecture and natural beauty. He developed an early appreciation for the rich history of the area, and began studying art history in high school. As a teenager he assisted his father in the complete restoration of a water mill and windmill, both historically significant local structures, during his summer holidays. Mitchell attended DeMontfort University in Leicester, England to pursue a Fine Arts degree, but switched majors to eventually graduate with an Honours degree in Graphic Design under the mentorship of John Grace. His career began in 1985 as a pioneer in computer animation at Electronic Arts and Array Productions in London and led to work at London post-production facility The Mill, where he introduced 2-D morphing to the London industry. Phil has won numerous international awards (Golden Arrow, Spot Italia, Imagina-Pixel INA, etc.) for his work on animated commercials. In 1985, Phil joined Electronic Arts in London as a computer animator and worked on all in-house character animation projects with conventional animators. Among his many projects was the Smarties commercial Wembley Stadium, which went on to win the Golden Arrow at the British Advertising Awards in 1986. Phil moved on to Array Productions in London in 1987 as a computer animator, Phil's award-winning projects included the widely respected commercial for Smarties, Classroom (winner CG On-line Best Commercial, London 1989) and the ground breaking commercial for Nintendo Super Mario 3 (winner, CG On-line Best Commercial, London 1990). In March 1990, Phil was voted Best Computer Artist in Direction Magazine in London. Phil was then taken on board by The Mill in London as a senior animator in 1991 where he was responsible for introducing the company to 2D morphing, making them the first post-production facility in London to have the technology at the time. With Gavin Blair, Phil worked on numerous award-winning projects including Glassex's Clean With Care (winner, SpotItalia Silver Award, Milan 1991), Toblerone's Madame (winner, Silver Medal, Imagina Pixel-INA, Monte Carlo 1993), Nationwide Building Society's Doorbells (winner, BAFTA, Best Animation Effects, London 1993) and John Smith's Bitter (winner, Bronze Arrow, British Advertising Awards, London 1993). After immigrating to Canada in 1993 to co-found Mainframe Entertainment, Inc. Phil was part of the team that created ReBoot™, the first-ever computer animated television series. Until recently, he was a senior executive at Mainframe, which has consistently produced award-winning television productions and movies for young audiences around the world. In November 2005 he joined Singapore's Infinite Frameworks to work on their CG feature project “Sing to the Dawn” as director. Phil began painting again with acrylics in 2000 as a creative pursuit and to keep his hands busy after quitting smoking. Recently, in February 2007 he attended the "John Grace Memorial Conference" in Nottingham (UK), celebrating the best of British Computer Animation. Held in honour of the late John Grace, another pioneering co-creator of ReBoot. Category:ReBoot Staff